


Nobody remembers who built the temple

by Leshaya



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Avengers Family, Awesome Pepper Potts, Domestic Fluff, Everyone Is Alive, F/M, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Mild Drama, Multi, Platonic Female/Male Relationships, Platonic Life Partners, Platonic Relationships, Platonic Romance, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Protective Pepper Potts, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Team as Family, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Translation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:35:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23930914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leshaya/pseuds/Leshaya
Summary: The war has ended.This fic was written for the Stony Russian fest. The prompt was:Movie canon, but Tony and Natasha are alive. Tony has a bionic arm after his snap, Steve doesn't go anywhere. Pepperony slowly transfers into Stony with some inner turmoils, but as a result they all are happy.  Explicit rating is optional, but very warm hugs will be welcomed, especially when it's all still subtle and "we can't".
Relationships: Pepper Potts & Steve Rogers, Pepper Potts & Tony Stark, Pepper Potts/Steve Rogers/Tony Stark (sort of), Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 12
Kudos: 67
Collections: Marvel Trumps Hate 2019





	Nobody remembers who built the temple

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RoseRose](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseRose/gifts).
  * A translation of [Никто не помнит, кто построил храм](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23932435) by [avadakedavra](https://archiveofourown.org/users/avadakedavra/pseuds/avadakedavra). 



> The title is from the song [“Temple”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z83uGEiI1Oc) by the Russian band Splean.  
> 
>
>> Nobody remembers who built the temple <...>  
> But everyone remembers who set it on fire <...>  
> Only the one who was building the temple for so long  
> Can burn it to the ground in one moment.  
> 
> 
> This fic was translated as my MTH 2019 fill. RoseRose, thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to translate this amazing text!  
> Many thanks to my great betas [Fatalit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fatalit/profile) and [starksnack](https://www.archiveofourown.org/users/starksnack/profile). They literally saved me.  
> And of course, all my love goes to the original author [avadakedavra](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23932435). Please give them your kudos!

They say they had so many castles with so many goods  
even ten people couldn’t count  
And everyone knew them.  
“Padmakar, can you grant a wish?”  
“Anything you want.”  
“Then I would like some tea with honey and ginger, please.”  
_from a poem by Vera Polozkova, Russian poetess_

 _This is how it all ends:_ Pepper is getting angry. Pepper is getting very, very, very angry.

Although it’s not quite right. You know what? Forget it, throw it all away. Forget it, because even “angry” combined with the triple “very” is too mildly put. Pepper is fucking _furious_. Her caustic and concentrated fury floats around her like invisible haze and it seems palpable for anyone approaching the danger zone. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to surround herself with billboards warning each and every one of those silly journalists, boring stockholders and especially Tony Stark when he’s not in his suit, “Don’t come closer if you don’t want to be murdered in cold blood for no one will shed a single tear for your unpretentious commemoration”.

Pepper lets out a vicious and desperate cry and makes half a step away from the fridge. She shuts the fridge door, purses her lips (she hasn’t applied her lip liner and her favorite matte lipstick yet cause she wanted to eat breakfast first) and lingers for about eight seconds just to make sure. Then she risks pulling the heavy metallic door and inspects all the shelves from top to bottom; she even checks the vegetable drawer. FRIDAY confirms her wildest guesses and her voice seems full with sympathy for Pepper who found herself in such a difficult situation this not-so-great Friday morning.

Pepper snorts annoyingly once again and gives up.

Fortune doesn’t favor her and treats her badly so she has to make do with an omelet and a bright pink sticky note on the fridge. The paper asks angrily “Who ate all of my cherry yogurt, you villains” and contains three question marks, four accusingly exclamatory marks and two emojis. The first one is wicked and the second one is sad. Pepper considers for a moment and redraws the sad smiley for a wicked one. It will be more effective.

Pepper knows it will work. It always works no matter what.

When Pepper leaves her house, she is satisfied with her breakfast. She savors the punishment that is to befall the infidels. When she returns home from the Tower that evening, she sees an incriminating postscript from Captain. It implies that it was Tony. Tony’s post-postscript reads, “I thought we were friends, traitor.”

The nearby light-green sticky note contains an eight-eyed heart from Morgan. The top shelf of the fridge contains a lot of food. Their entire family could live on this cherry yogurt for about two months. Pepper’s favorite vase with her favorite gerberas stands on the kitchen table; this is a beautiful full-blown bouquet laced with a satin ribbon.

Oh-h, wheedlers!

The productive working day gave her a nice tiredness, but now this tiredness is receding, rolling away somehow. Pepper smiles widely, snatches two jars at once, takes a tablespoon and goes to the porch. She sits there at the hammock with her legs comfortably tucked up.

The September sunset paints the railing and her deck chairs gold, Morgan’s cries of joy and Tony’s sincere laughter reach her from the lake. The phone vibrates.

Pepper rolls her eyes and switches off the notifications.

Then she fidgets a little on the soft cushions, carefully tears away the foil from the first jar and licks it with a happy groan.

***

_This is how it all begins:_ with psychotherapy. Pepper would be glad to say it all begins with morning coffee, or good sex, or a new idea showing up in her undoubtedly bright mind, but it wouldn’t be true. It all begins with psychotherapy.

Pepper pays Miss Gretta three times as much as she could imagine herself paying at least a year ago. Miss Gretta points out very common, but very necessary things, cause it seems almost everybody in this brand new world needs such things.

“It is normal,” Miss Gretta says.

And, “Don’t you think you’re the only one with such issues.”

And also, “Find something to help yourself focus on the present.”

It seems this world doesn’t smell like it should. It still smells like blood, like burnt human and not-exactly-human flesh, like dirt and hot dust. Like death? Like war. This odor of victorious battle is still the odor of battle and it chases Pepper everywhere: when she runs along the wide forest trail around the lake, when she rides in a car, when she sits in her office on the forty-first floor. When she attends the charity gala in honor of the Blip’s first small anniversary, when she comes to the small or big conference room. When she flies to Istanbul for a business meeting.

Pepper throws up in a tiny toilet twenty-five thousand feet above the ground.

Miss Gretta advises her to focus, so Pepper focuses.

Pepper focuses on the Starbucks cup smelling like hot coffee, brown sugar and whipping cream; her assistant brings it to her and this girl deserves a pay raise. Pepper focuses on the scent of caramel shampoo and coconut cookies on Morgan’s hair. Pepper focuses on her home, smelling of burnt pizza (Tony still can’t cope with the easiest recipe), machine oil and Steve Rogers’s slightly old-fashioned nice cologne.

This smell presents itself more and more often lately.

Pepper notices that Steve visits for the holidays.

Steve visits for the weekend barbecue.

Steve visits them on weekdays when he finds himself in the neighborhood. He stays for the night because “hey, Cap, where are you going? it’s pitch-dark outside, idiot.” Pepper thinks Steve’s psychotherapist earns about the same as Miss Gretta. Maybe Steve’s psychotherapist recommends that he “focuses” too.

To be honest, Pepper isn’t sure Steve has something to focus on. It can’t be the shield because he passes it on to Sam Wilson for long-term use and it definitely can’t be Fury’s offers to organize a new team because Steve politely and methodically declines them.

Steve visits, brings sweets for Morgan and green grapes for Pepper and she doesn’t know whether it’s more the debt he feels he owes Tony or simple human loneliness causing his regular visits. Or maybe it’s more his search for a safe place untouched by the recent one-day (but what an awful one day) Great War.

Maybe it is all of that.

It is all of that and so much more, so Pepper thoroughly considers it and says one fine morning, “You can stay here with us, Steve.” For some reason she expected Steve to immediately refuse, but he doesn’t. “Tony will be all for it. To be honest, considering Friday’s shopping list last month, I suppose he already thinks that you live with us.”

To be honest, Pepper caught herself thinking the same thing. She was sitting on the porch in the wicker chair, sipping her mojito and shielding her eyes with her cap, while Steve and Tony were trying to set up a garden swing and failing miserably.

As usual, Tony endlessly ranted about his technical genius. As usual, Steve endlessly ranted about Tony’s lack of common sense. Of course, it had ended with a fight where Tony had the garden hose for the repulsors and Steve had a piece of cardboard from the swing packaging in place of his shield.

Morgan had fun and that was the most important thing.

Pepper smiles softly at the memory and goes on just in case, “You know it’s dangerous to let them out of sight. I would like to have an accomplice in this house.”

Steve blushes. He rewards Pepper with a small, guilty and shy smile and just says, “Okay.”

And of course, “Thank you, Pepper. Thank you so much.”

***

_This is how it all really begins:_ for a long seven weeks after the victory Tony doesn’t go downstairs to his workshop. Before that Pepper thought his crazy innovative non-stop work was the bane of her existence, but now she would give almost anything to smell the tart scent of sweat and machine oil on his skin again. Or to pretend to understand his hour-long lectures on particles invented by Tony himself, super-powerful radiation and also something starting with “nano”.

In the first couple of days, Tony cobbles up a bionic arm to replace the one that had saved their world and then dissolved to the bone in everybody’s sight. However this bionic arm is not calibrated, upgraded and developed for many days in a row and it is, well… it is completely wrong.

Tony learns to manage with just his left arm instead of doing all kinds of things he would have done ten or even five years ago.

Pepper purses her lips and winces while watching this and so does Steve.

Pepper doesn’t try to give out edifying guidance and neither does Steve. He knows all too well how Tony would kick his ass for such initiatives.

On the other hand, Steve brings Bucky Barnes to their home and Pepper doesn’t consider it a good idea. Nevertheless she was smart and confident enough to admit her mistakes without dying on the spot. Because Bucky Barnes really helps.

And so do doctor Banner, Black Widow, Sam Wilson in his new Captain America mode. So do the restless Scott Lang, Clint Barton with his entire pack, the talking (god help them) raccoon and the Parker boy.

“They think I don’t understand,” Tony grumbles kindly. “They think I don’t know the rules of this dirty, disgusting, humiliating game.”

Steve laughs. He winks at Pepper because nobody (including Tony) thinks so and everybody (including Tony) does know the rules.

“Hey!!!” Clint cries out in the kitchen so loudly that Pepper goes deaf on the porch. “What about the cheesy sauce?!”

Natasha throws back her head and answers almost as loudly, “Don’t forget my sweet and sour!!!”

Of course, Clint forgets.

They all want a barbecue in the Stark’s backyard. They all want a team selfie for the Avenger Instagram account, where Morgan sits on Bruce Banner’s shoulders and Hawkeye's youngest on Steve’s, both kids wearing Iron Man masks with eerie glowing eye-sockets. They all want a good company, a beer night, a heated argument on something long forgotten but still relevant.

They all urgently and desperately want immediate and complex upgrades to their suits, armor and the Bartons’ microwave. Tony needs at least two efficiently working arms to handle such upgrades (oh yes, they all do know the rules).

“At least…” Tony drawls thoughtfully. He wears a wrinkled t-shirt, he hasn’t slept for two days, he has a pink pencil behind his right ear. The pencil is Morgan’s and Tony just probably grabbed the first one he found. “But nobody says that it's the most I can do... Am I right..?”

Tony smiles widely and plainly.

Tony winks at Morgan sitting across him.

Pepper waves her hands at him and manages to hit him with a kitchen towel that was just lying around, but at the same time she thinks, “ _Make it ten, baby. Make ten arms, baby, if you want, just don’t lose this light, please, don’t lose your passion. It becomes softer with the years, but yes, it still warms and feeds you every day. You should create, invent, swear at Steve who is about as useful as Dummy in your workshop, yet you keep him there. Remember that you won the war. You deserve this glint in your eyes and yes, you deserve the most unhelpful helpers in the world too._ ”

“What about pizza?” Steve asks the same night and drops on the sofa next to Pepper. His cheek is smeared with machine oil and Pepper wipes it off with the side of her hand.

“With pineapples?” Morgan inquires captiously as she looks away from her Barbies. Judging by the chaos on the carpet, they are having a serious rumble with two toy Thors and one Black Widow without a left leg. “Can I have pizza with pineapples? Pretty please!”

“No pineapples!” Tony yells from the stairs. “Pepper, no pineapples, or I’ll file for divorce!”

Pepper rolls her eyes.

“Call the delivery service, Cap.”

“And ask for as many pineapples as possible?”

“Exactly.”

***

_This is how it all settles down:_ all three of them are watching a black and white movie. Tony indulges himself as he puts his head on Pepper’s lap and his bare feet on Steve’s lap. When Tony starts to comment the show too emotionally, Steve grips him by the ankles and tickles his feet. Pepper jumps in on the fun as she pulls his ears, glares at him and shushes him if he kicks too aggressively, “If you wake Morgan, it will be the end of you, Tony.”

“Uh-huh,” Steve agrees with a revengeful smile and drags his nails from Tony’s heel to toes one last time. He doesn’t let go of the twitching leg. “It will be the end of you, Tony.”

Tony lets out an offended snort and murmurs something obscene but he calms down obediently so they watch the movie for another half an hour in blissful peace. Then Tony falls asleep. Pepper notices it only when Steve pauses the movie, carefully touches her shoulder and nods at Tony’s funny sleepy frown and wildly open mouth.

Pepper definitely needs this photo in her collection. She doesn’t deny herself this pleasure and takes a dozen shots. Stark Industries corporate Instagram will blow up and the debris will be retweeted all over the Internet.

It will be fun.

Pepper smiles at Steve’s cheerful look and gives him a slightly guilty shrug.

“I just want you to know that I don’t mind it,” Steve says. Pepper arches her eyebrows inquiringly.

“Really?”

“Just send me the photos.”

They turn the volume so low that it’s barely audible and watch the movie together till the end. It’s a good movie.

“Can I help you with anything..?” Steve starts doubtfully when Pepper carefully stands up and places Tony’s head on the pillow. At this, Tony snores very loudly, and Pepper stretches blissfully, warming up numb muscles. “I mean, I could take him… bring him to your bedroom?”

Pepper yawns so wildly and sweetly that her jaw spasms. She considers her options, frowns a little and shakes her head.

“We’ll wake him,” she says regretfully. “And he won’t fall back asleep.”

She doesn’t add that he won’t let her sleep either.

They cover Tony with two blankets. Steve chews his lips as he thinks something over and then asks the obvious question. “Should I stay with him?”

“Can you? It would be nice.”

Pepper feels a little guilty about her faint but nasty sense of relief. She loves Tony, she really loves him, very much. But she has to get up at an ungodly hour tomorrow. And she has plenty of nightmares.

“Good.”

Good, yes.

Pepper brings some comforters and pillows for Steve and they make an makeshift bed for him on the floor near the sofa. Tony never wakes up, he just turns to the other side and mutters with hatred, “No, no sunflowers, please no.”

Pepper looks at Steve just in time to see his soft and generous smile. It’s a rare guest on his face.

Also, she sees how Steve quickly looks away, moves towards Tony and adjusts the blanket to cover his feet.

“Thank you, Steve,” Pepper says sincerely. Suddenly she feels that this whole experience is awfully and inexplicably awkward. It’s terribly intimate; it brings her and Steve together and separates them with some invisible line at the same time. Pepper wants to go to her bedroom, throw on her favorite pajamas and crawl under a warm blanket as soon as possible.

“It’s the least I can do for you,” Steve says.

“ _For him_ ,” Pepper corrects in her mind. For Tony.

For Pepper’s sake Steve lets Morgan paint his toenails in the most godawful colors imaginable. For Pepper’s sake Steve carries heavy bags and listens with keen interest to her talking about awfully boring Stark Industries stockholders’ meetings.

But when Steve stays downstairs to sleep on the living room floor, it’s not for her sake.

But it’s all right, Pepper thinks. It’s okay.

Before she leaves, she leans down and kisses Tony on the forehead just beneath his graying hair. Then she steps to Steve, rises on her toes and kisses him on his immediately flushing cheek.

And for the moment, for this very moment, Steve seems somewhat different to her. As if he turns into that two-thousand-and-twelve boy who had just come from under the ice, who feels constantly confused and who barely knows what’s going on.

She should embarrass him more often.

She definitely should do it, fuck yeah.

“Good night, Pepper.”

“Good night, Steve.”

Pepper has a very good sleep that night.

***

_This is how it all becomes obvious to Pepper and anyone who can see (besides Tony and Steve, of course)_ : they smile at each other just as characters do in the cheapest and dumbest melodramas which are aired for a week at best and aim to pay off a third of their budget at least.

Pepper catches them as they coo over Steve’s motorcycle, and Bucky Barnes’ arm, and Tony’s arm and even Peter Parker’s suit.

Pepper catches them as they simultaneously argue with FRIDAY and lose spectacularly.

Pepper is proud when she catches Morgan in the workshop. She is proud of all three of them.

Pepper brings two coffees and a plate of sandwiches in their den on her rare free Friday. She stops in mid-stride as she sometimes does; she leans on the doorframe and lets herself enjoy the view.

Tony and Steve are in the middle of a heated discussion. It is such a captivating sight. Tony waves his bionic arm, clicks with metallic fingers and snorts. He is disheveled, dirty and indecently happy. Steve mutters indistinctly. He is covered in sweat and very focused. They are sitting impossibly close, poring over something lying on the table. When they bump their shoulders, they straighten up almost in synch, turn and gaze at each other with absolutely identical silly smiles.

Jesus Christ.

Grant me patience and strength and send an invoice in Stark Industries name, Pepper thinks with a heavy sigh.

She starts to count Mississippi and comes to the fifth, before she knocks on the doorframe with her heel, chuckles wickedly and says, “Delivery!”

It’s sheer pleasure to watch them get shy and embarrassed, turn away, purse their lips and try to look serious.

“Shit, Pepps! Do you have to frighten me?”

“Tony!”

“One more word, and Captain will have both coffees.”

To be honest, Pepper enjoys embarrassing them in the workshop, and the kitchen, and the living room; they stick like glue to each other almost everywhere. It’s so sincere and so obvious, but at the same time so naive that they almost embarrass _her_.

“Don’t you..?” Natasha asks vaguely when she stops by for a coffee. They are sitting in the living room and Morgan is excitedly working some magic on Natasha’s rich light-red curls. Pepper feels a little guilty because Natasha might have to spend about an hour combing her hair and teasing out cookie crumbs and LEGO parts. Haute couture needs an awful lot of sacrifice.

“I don’t,” Pepper answers vaguely as well. She means all of it.

_I don’t mind, I don’t feel jealous, I don’t think badly of them._

When Morgan asks whether Natasha prefers a lilac scrunchie or a blue one, Natasha considers it seriously and cheerfully asks whether she could have both, because of course it would be more beautiful.

Morgan is delighted.

They hear Steve and Tony’s good-natured argument in the kitchen as they try to cook dinner. Natasha gives her a long and intent look, and Pepper holds up well. She doesn’t have to explain anything to anyone besides maybe herself, and this is… this is laughably simple all of a sudden.

Her relationship with Tony will never be what it was in their very first year, Pepper knows that. It won’t be even what it was in the first five years. The thing is, Pepper doesn’t need it. Pepper likes how the relationship flows and carries on, how it changes with time and their needs, how its sharp edges wear off and it becomes… just right. It becomes rational and reasonable, peaceful and joyful.

And what’s most important, it suits all of them.

“Tony..!” comes a desperate yell from the kitchen, and Pepper doesn’t want at all to know what’s going on there. “Holy shit, Tony!”

“Language, Rogers,” Tony scolds. By the sound of it, he is using his bionic arm as a shield against the pancake pan. “Ouch!”

Pepper catches Natasha’s eye, and they laugh. After that, they nod to each other simultaneously and seriously.

“Chinese cuisine?”

“Chinese cuisine.”

“Pepper, and..?”

“Double sweet-and-sour sauce. I remember.”

***

_This is how it all becomes obvious even for Tony and Steve:_ Pepper is sitting in the living room with Steve’s sketchbook in her lap. The book itself is very classical — high-quality paper bound in a simple leather cover; Pepper ordered it for Christmas from the same company that makes a stylish neat diary for her each quarter. On the first page it’s her and Morgan; Pepper is sitting on this very sofa in this very living room where she is sitting now, with her bare feet on the coffee table and with her favorite home laptop nestled comfortably on her stomach. Morgan is sleeping, curled up beside her. Pepper can’t help tracing her fingers along the sharp pencil lines of thick, slightly curly hair.

Then there is Pepper again. Then there are Natasha, Bucky and Clint’s entire family.

Then there is mostly Tony. Pepper flicks through his portraits in the workshop, in the kitchen, in the workshop again. Of course, Tony is good-looking. He is handsome and vibrant, captured in such intimate moments of happiness, or confusion, or morning sleepy grumping, that Pepper feels a little uncomfortable. Her chest swells with fondness, and it overcomes her, fills her from head to toes.

Pepper stops somewhere in the middle of the sketchbook. After a clumsy fast sketch of Rocket and Bucky there is Tony again.

The shading is soft and thoroughly done. Tony is sitting on the porch, engrossed in reading something on his tablet. He is frowning — his forehead is covered with deep long wrinkles. Tony is so carried away that he doesn’t notice that Morgan has already stuck a dozen of flowers into his overgrown and disheveled hair, and she is sneaking around the corner with a new bunch.

Pepper is so sorry she cannot draw like this.

She smiles, looking at the picture.

“Morning,” Steve mutters as he appears in the doorway. Pepper manages to mumble something vague like “uh-huh”. “Did you sleep well?”

“I did. Did you? Tony is in the workshop, isn’t he?”

“I slept well. And — yes, as always he is.”

Steve makes breakfast for Pepper. Every day he gets up earlier than he needs to and cooks something criminally tasty in such quantities that it would be enough to feed a modest SWAT unit.

All in all, it’s just enough for Pepper to last till lunch without killing any employees or suppliers.

Today he cooks something with milk; Pepper sniffs — and it smells sweet and tender. Steve chuckles and places a bowl of oatmeal with fresh berries on top in front of her. Suddenly he notices his sketchbook open in her lap.

He is immediately confused.

He is immediately embarrassed.

He is immediately frightened.

“I’m sorry,” Pepper says softly. “I should have asked for your permission first. But it was open when I saw it.”

“Forget it.”

Steve lets out a long sigh and smiles forcefully. Pepper suspects why he reacts this way.

Maybe, she thinks, he already knows that his drawings of Tony give him away completely. Because it is definitely so. They give him away.

It could have been a problem if nothing else gave him away. If it weren’t for his every second glance and every first touch. If Tony didn’t give himself away with the same tell-tale signs for the past few months.

It could have been a problem if Pepper were deaf and blind like the two of them and if she still were in not-so-blissful ignorance.

“They’re beautiful,” Pepper says plainly and honestly. “Your works are very beautiful, Steve. Do you mind if we hang a few in the house? I could have them framed.”

Steve turns red, then white, then wavers for a long time. At last, as if it were written all over Pepper’s face just like it was written in his sketchbook, he says out of place, “Pepper, I am…” he stumbles and adds heatedly, “Pepper, I would never..!”

Pepper stops him with a wave of her hand, a smile, and general calmness. Pepper says, “It’s okay.”

Pepper doesn’t know how to describe it, how to explain something so seemingly simple.

_My love for him will never end._

_We haven’t slept together for a long, long time, because it’s not about this._

_You will never understand him as well as I do, but you don’t need it, because there will be something else between you and him. It will not be better or worse, it will be your own way._

_He will never treat you as he treats me, because you won’t meet him after his Afghanistan kidnapping and you won’t give birth to a baby he would love with all his heart. But you won a war with him, you brought him long-awaited peace when you gave in and made amends, you took the shield that he had made for you. You are with him right here, right now._

_This counts for quite a lot in the realm of Tony Stark. In fact, it counts for quite a lot in any realm._

Pepper doesn’t know how to explain all this so she repeats just in case, “It’s okay, Steve. Really.”

They stare at each other. And it seems, Steve understands. At least he relaxes a little and pushes the bowl closer to Pepper.

“It’s getting cold.”

The oatmeal tastes absolutely divine. It makes her long for more.

When something thumps and clanks in the kitchen, when a sleepy, disheveled and already grumpy Tony appears in the doorway, Pepper is sipping her coffee in the living room. The sketchbook rests on the edge of the coffee table; it’s closed.

“Ugh,” Tony says, “This is oatmeal.”

He adds firmly, “I don’t eat oatmeal.”

And he repeats just in case, “Ugh.”

Steve rolls his eyes.

“You do,” he says melancholically, almost languidly as he walks towards Tony.

Four minutes later, after a short and not-too-heated argument, Tony joins Pepper in the living room and wishes her good morning. His mouth is stuffed with oatmeal.

From the look on his face, he enjoys the taste too.

***

_This is how they find the answer to the question no one asked:_ Tony says, “I love you.”

“I love you,” Pepper replies immediately.

It’s almost midnight, and a fortress made of pillows and blankets hides them from the big cruel world, where Steve Rogers got the short end of the stick.

They just have had a tea-party for seven (if you can count a huge stuffed bear and two transformers as persons), and before that, a three-course dinner. The first course, the second course and the dessert consisted of various cookies with peanut butter.

Now Pepper and Tony have an empty fortress, and Steve has Morgan (upstairs in the very last room to the right). Morgan wants a fairytale, one more fairytale, to pee, to have a glass of water and once again to pee. What she doesn’t want is to sleep, Pepper knows that for sure.

“Let’s stay here forever,” Pepper whispers. The dim night-light is enough to see a smile on Tony’s lips.

“If you’d like.”

Tony reaches for her, and Pepper eagerly meets him halfway. They take their time as they kiss; they don’t part their lips, their noses touch funnily and cozily. Pepper perceives Tony as he is, all of him, he becomes a collection of aspects like a beam of light broken by a prism. Pepper feels his warm tenderness, his love and his promise to protect her.

Pepper feels his guilt.

It’s in every touch and every word. It’s quiet and thick, itchy, pushy and nasty, and Pepper doesn’t like it at all.

Of course, Pepper saw the two of them when they were barely touching.

Of course, Pepper saw them when they were sitting closer than ever, laughing and talking quietly about something in midnight whispers.

Of course, Pepper saw them when they were reaching for each other. They bumped with their lips, kissed briefly and clumsily, and instantly recoiled.

As if Pepper cared about it.

_Dear God, I asked you to grant me patience. It seems, your delivery service is not doing its job._

She touches Tony’s face, and he shuts his eyes, snuggles up to her, presses his cheek into her hand, prickling it with his stubble. Pepper scolds him kindly.

After that, they talk about the state of Stark Industries for a while. They discuss what to order for dinner tomorrow, and Tony projects three short videos with kittens straight onto the fortress ceiling using his watch.

Then Pepper says, “If Captain America tried to kiss me, I wouldn’t be so slow-witted.” She is glad to see such aggressive confusion on his usually smug face (it’s so nice to take the genius down a peg from time to time), so she adds, “Hey, mister, are you really Tony Stark?”

Tony quickly pulls himself together, pinches her side and clarifies grumpily, as if Pepper said something awfully dumb, “He is not Captain America anymore.”

Pepper raises her eyebrows, “And this is your argument? I’d give it a C. Maybe even less.”

When he tries to pinch her one more time, she manages to roll away. Tony disappointedly hums and attacks her. Pepper defends herself, they get all tangled together, laughing, and destroy one of the walls of the fortress. As a result, three other walls and the roof collapse on their heads, turning into an endless sea of pillows and blankets.

“I don’t deserve you,” Tony mutters as he catches his breath. He doesn’t even try to get out of the debris. “I have never deserved you.”

Pepper chuckles and blows away a loose strand of hair from her forehead.

“Well,” she twists her mouth. “It’s nice to see that we finally agree on something.”

“You nasty woman!” Tony shouts, and yes, they start another round. When Steve comes back to the living room, they are on the verge of divorce and they are laughing so hard that their stomachs (at least Pepper’s stomach) hurt.

“Ouch, Morgan will chew you out for demolishing her fortress,” Steve clicks his tongue, smiles and folds his arms on his chest.

Pepper lifts her head. From this angle, Steve looks like a real giant.

“Damn,” she whispers hoarsely, “Morgan.”

“Damn,” Tony agrees hoarsely as well. He waits for half a minute and drawls pleadingly, “Hey, Cap... The world is in danger. We need your help.”

Steve rolls his eyes and helps Pepper to stand up. Tony gets up himself.

It takes them two hours and one pillow fight to rebuild the fortress.

***

_This is how it all really ends:_ Pepper goes on a business trip to Beijing for three long weeks and she badly misses her home. Every day she calls around midnight, her time, and talks to each of them in turn.

Morgan tells her a thousand and one interesting stories about her day.

When Steve is not around, Tony tells her that Fury seems to be making progress, finally. Maybe Steve isn’t so strongly averse to doing something not-super-superheroic (like saving the world), but superheroic enough (like managing others while they save the world).

It’s funny, because when Tony is not around, Steve says the same about him.

Pepper nods and smiles at them, dreaming of going back to the States.

Steve says something like, “Nat and Clint came today.”

Or Steve says, “Bucky and Tony broke the garden swing accidentally.”

Steve says, “Look at this,” and Pepper pulls off her shoes using her toes, falls onto the bed in her hotel room, groans happily and brings the tablet closer to her eyes.

Steve shows her the living room, the kitchen, the office and the stairs leading to the first floor. Every horizontal, inclined and some vertical surfaces are covered with an endless web of toy railways. A real suspension bridge is towering on the kitchen table.

“Oh my God,” Pepper sighs.

The video blurs, and in a second Steve’s face appears again. He smiles.

“Is my bedroom in the same state of chaos?” Pepper asks sorrowfully. Steve moves closer to the camera and lowers his voice.

“They are in a big need of one more railway station. I’m still putting up a defense, but I don’t know how much longer I can hold out.”

They laugh, and then Pepper asks, “Do they sleep at all?” She adds doubtfully and hopefully, “At least sometimes?”

“They sleep sometimes,” Steve answers evasively. “It’s just that we got four new toy sets a couple of days ago…”

Pepper sighs once again. “It was said that you would destroy the Sith,” she grumbles light-heartedly, “not join them!”

Steve shrugs vaguely. Pepper still can’t believe how his eyes light up, signaling to everyone that he understood one more reference, wow!

They talk some more: about weather in Beijing, about a boring dinner that Pepper has just returned from, about FRIDAY who can’t hold out without her and soon will defect to the enemy’s side. In this case, by the time Pepper triumphantly comes back, their house will lie in ruins.

“I miss you all,” Pepper says finally.

“We miss you too, Pepper,” Steve smiles.

“Pepper?” She can hear Tony’s voice off-screen. In a second, he appears on camera, as if someone waved a magic wand. As always, he wears a wrinkled undershirt. He also sports a bruise on the neck… Is that a hickey? Oh yes, it is. Pepper chuckles softly. “Who said Pepper? Where is Pepper? Hello, Pepper!”

“Mummy!” Morgan cries and rushes up to her father.

Pepper gets more comfortable on puffy hotel pillows, and rests the tablet against her bent knees.

Pepper laughs when all three of them somehow manage to fit on the screen.

It seems that even here, on the one hundred and seventh floor in polluted Beijing, Pepper can feel how Morgan smells of sweet shampoo. How Tony smells of gun oil and Steve. How Steve smells of her home.

_This is the smell of a safe place untouched by war and death._


End file.
